The Shadow
by blackdragonhellfire
Summary: A more metaphorical approach to the infamous duality (or lack thereof) between Bruce Wayne and Batman. Introspection, based on the Nolanverse movies and Comic Canon.


**So I actually wrote this for my school's art and literature magazine, but I didn't have an original idea, so I thought, 'What if I write something about Batman for this, but make it really vague, and see how long anyone takes to notice that it's actually about Batman?'**

 **I'm screwed, to put it lightly. But I did add some stuff/context to it because if you clicked on this, you know who it's about, so I can say stuff like "Gotham City" and "Alfred."**

 **But, do enjoy, despite the weirdness of it all.**

 **(Also on AO3 under my pseud sxnxnymous628)**

* * *

A boy sat limp on a patch of concrete, surrounded by the pools of red blood that used be in the veins of the people laying dead by his feet, pumped by their now dead hearts and through their now dead bodies, animating their corpses and giving them vitality.

Now, it had spilled out of their bodies and stained the dirty concrete around them a grotesque red, leaving its owners limp and cold. What vitality the red had given the two corpses had been taken from them with two pulls of the trigger of a cheap pistol, which had taken the lives of the corpses on the ground.

Yet, those two shots designed to kill also gave birth to a new creature. A shadow that would put fear into the hearts of those who would deign to spill the lifeblood of others the way they had taken the lives of the people who now lay on the ground. A shadow that would eventually create a third corpse join the bodies on the pavement, taking over its host and perverting it into a twisted version of himself, bitter and consumed by his own sorrow and trauma.

Meanwhile, the boy sat down on the pavement by the bodies of his parents, looking numbly at the corpses that used to be the two people he had cared about most.

There was no blood on the pavement where he sat.

* * *

The shadow had originally come to boy in the form of an idea.

He had been sitting on his couch, thinking back to that fateful night, when the idea flew into his head, digging its claws and roosting in the young boy's brain. The idea was an idea of a seemingly benevolent nature, an idea that would fix to the city that had ultimately killed off the people who had given him life, that would honor his parents and their legacy...

...but, ultimately, the idea was still a shadow, a twisted idea of justice, and the boy was its sustenance.

And he would be for years to come, until there was nothing left of him.

 _What if I could keep people from having to go through what I had to go through?_ The boy thought. _What if I could finally get justice for them?_

 _(If they were here, would they be proud of me?)_

* * *

The boy grew from a troubled boy into a troubled young man, and despite years having passed since the tragedy had created it, the shadow refused to move on.

In his numbness, the man coasted through life, floating from one thing to another to another, never finding solid ground. Never finding a purpose, or another reason to live besides one day avenging the deaths of his parents.

But could he do it? Would he do it?

Was it worth it?

He didn't feel the shadow's claws digging deeper into him with every thought.

* * *

The man couldn't take it anymore.

He couldn't take pretending to be someone he knew he wasn't, a person who threw away people and money as often as others threw away old food. That person was a farce, a facade that convinced others that he wasn't the little boy who missed his parents anymore.

That convinced him that he wasn't that little boy anymore.

That fooled him into thinking that he had gotten over the far-fetched idea of taking the matter of vengeance into his own hands.

He needed to find himself.

And he knew that he had to get out from the stifling influence of Gotham to do it.

* * *

 _"You must become something more than a man," His teacher told him, one snowy day,"You must become an idea. After all, you can kill a man, but you cannot kill something intangible. Something powerful."_

 _The man sidestepped his teacher's blow, and thrust his Ninjato towards his teacher's armored chest. The move was easily blocked by his teacher, and the student sidestepped away before he could be on the receiving end of his opponent's counterattack._

 _"Why?"_

 _The teacher had anticipated his student's move, stepping forward and using the butt of his sword to aim a blow to his student's head, poised to knock him out. Instead of completing the move, however, he stopped short just as his student was in the middle of dodging, and tripped his opponent._

 _The student fell onto the floor, too tired from the day's intense training to catch himself._

 _"When one is human, their opponent will, whether it be eventually or immediately, pick out their flaws at some point. In this dog-eat-dog world, it is only standard to use these flaws against ones opponent. But, when one is something inhuman, a symbol, they don't seem to have the weaknesses a human ultimately possesses. They can become feared, respected, immortal in the eyes of humanity."_

 _The teacher put out his hand to help his opponent up, but his student did not take it. Both teacher and student knew that that hand was a mocking one, a cruel one, and that the show of kindness was not there to help, but to mock the student's inability if he had chosen to take it._

 _The student helped himself up, and grabbed his weapon off of the ground, dusting off his armor._

 _He looked up at his teacher._

 _"So what must I become?"_

 _His teacher looked back at him, acidic green eyes meeting blue._

 _"You must become... a shadow."_

* * *

An old friend of the man's greeted him, many years later, as he stepped off of a passenger plane, and back onto the hallowed ground of the city where his parents had been killed in front of him.

The man stepped off of the plane, a changed man since the last time he had been to his home city. Since then, he had become what his teacher wanted him to be, despite spurning the man's teachings when he figured out the true purpose behind them.

No matter what, he would never, ever become the murderer Ra's al Ghul and the League of Assassins had wanted him to be, but thanks to their teachings, he would always be a symbol, an idea…

A shadow.

"Alfred," he said to his friend, holding a threadbare bag across his chest, "I'm back."

* * *

 **I tried. Really. This is just a practice/vent writing thing, not an AU(sadly.) Might write a crack!AU where Bruce doesn't become Batman, or becomes him later than in canon? I dunno.(I also have this Talon!Dick AU I want to write, but I want to be able to write the rest of the Batfam first.)**

 **Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this! Thanks for reading!**


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